Colon and rectal cancer seem to be on the rise—in millennials

A x-ray images of a colon filled with barium via an enema, one of the common ways to diagnose colorectal cancer.

Colorectal cancer is on the rise in young people. Don’t freak out.

Let’s start with the facts. Colorectal cancer is the third most common cancer in men and women in the U.S. It's called "colorectal" because it covers cancers that arise in the colon (which you know better as your intestines) or your rectum (come on, you know this one). This year about 130,000 - 140,000 people will be diagnosed and about 50,000 people will die from it (though most of them won’t be people who were diagnosed this year). Those rates have been dropping steadily